Lawmaker wants to see UT regent’s iPad, cell phone

Citing information that “sheds doubt” on the University of Texas regents’ compliance with the Texas open records law, Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer, D-San Antonio, wants the House committee investigating regent Wallace Hall to conduct “a forensic examination of the personal or professional electronic communications” of board members.

Martinez Fischer asked Houston attorney Rusty Hardin, who is serving as special counsel to the Select Committee on Transparency in State Agency Operations, to invite an expert witness to testify about the possibility of conducting the examination into Hall’s and other regents’ “personal computers, iPads, smart phones or other relevant devices for electronic communications.”

The committee recently heard testimony that regents do not use UT emails for conduct business. Martinez Fischer also wrote Hardin that the board’s general counsel told him that regents were “on their honor” to comply with open records requests. “She also stated that the UT System staff does not perform searches on the regents’ personal emails system to ensure compliance with the law,” he wrote Hardin.

He concluded that the Committee should conduct its own examination to determine whether regents have turned over all records it has requested.

Lawmakers are investigating Hall for possible impeachment for abusing his office in a personal witch hunt against UT-Austin president Bill Powers. Hall has complained that Powers hasn’t been truthful about the activities of the law school foundation, and inflated his fund-raising accounting. His attorney also suggested that Powers acquiesces when lawmakers seek favors for the admission of certain students.

Hall has inundated UT-Austin with massive open records requests — ironically, his attorneys say he is investigating whether the campus is complying with the open records law.